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Science in Alaska's Arctic Parks

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Science in Alaska's Arctic Parks National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior Alaska Park Science Alaska Region Science in Alaska's Arctic Parks Volume 16, Issue 1 Beaufort Sea Chukchi Sea Alaska Park Science Noatak National Preserve Volume 16, Issue 1 Cape Krusenstern Gates of the Arctic National April 2017 National Monument Park and Preserve Editor in Chief: Leigh Welling Managing Editor: Nina Chambers Kobuk Valley Arctic Circle Bering Land Bridge National Park Editor: Stacia Backensto National Preserve Guest Editors: Jim Lawler, Andrew Tremayne Design: Nina Chambers Yukon-Charley Rivers S K A National Preserve Contact Alaska Park Science at: L A [email protected] A Gulf of Alaska Bering Sea Alaska Park Science is the semi-annual science journal of the National Park Service Alaska Region. Each issue highlights research and scholarship on a theme important to the stewardship of Alaska’s parks. Publication in Alaska Park Science does not signify that the contents refect the views or policies of the National Park Service, nor does mention of trade names or commercial products constitute National Park Service endorsement or recommendation. Alaska Park Science can be found online at: www.nps.gov/subjects/alaskaparkscience/index.htm Table of Contents Alaska’s Northern Parks: The Wonder of the Applying Wilderness Character Monitoring Collaborative Conservation of the Rare Arctic ...............................................................1 in the Arctic .................................................37 Alaskan Yellow-billed Loon ........................79 Animal Icons as Peaceful Warriors—Beyond The Fate of Permafrost ................................39 Eurasian Metal Found in Ancient Alaska ...85 Science and Culture to Achieve Conservation .................................................7 Potential Effects of Permafrost Thaw on Rust in the Wilderness: The Story of Mining Arctic River Ecosystems ................................47 Machines in Yukon-Charley Rivers National Understanding Arctic Sea Ice in a Period of Preserve .......................................................87 Rapid Climatic Change ................................11 Perennial Snowfelds of the Central Brooks Range: Valuable Park Resources ................51 Why the National Park Service Cares about Tracking the First Marine Mammal Hunters Shipping in the Arctic .................................91 at Cape Espenberg, Bering Land Bridge Caribou: Nomads of the North ...................55 National Preserve ........................................15 Synthesis of Coastal Issues and Projects Lichens of the Arctic ...................................59 in the Western Arctic National Parklands ..95 Alaska Native Place Names in Arctic Muskox: An Iconic Arctic Species, Then and Parks ..............................................................21 National Park Service Participation in the Now ..............................................................63 Arctic Council .............................................101 Learning from the Past: Archaeological Declining Sheep Populations in Alaska’s Results from Cape Krusenstern National Arctic Parks ..................................................67 Monument ...................................................23 Small Mammals as Indicators of Climate, A Paleontological Inventory of Arctic Biodiversity, and Ecosystem Change ...........71 Parks .............................................................29 Cover photo: Muskoxen in Cape Krusenstern National Monument. Photo courtesy of Jared Hughey Alaska Park Science, Volume 16, Issue 1 Alaska’s Northern Parks: The Wonder of the Arctic James P. Lawler, Jeff Rasic, and Peter Neitlich, National Park Service The National Park Service manages enjoy the bounty of coastal resources, including five parks that fall partially or entirely within sea mammals and fish. Other communities the Arctic tundra biome, the ecoregion situated like Anaktuvuk Pass, Kobuk, Shungnak, and north of tree line. These five parks—Bering Ambler travel inland rivers and mountains and Land Bridge National Preserve, Cape harvest caribou, sheep, fish, and berries. But February 12, 2014 - Howard Pass, Noatak Krusenstern National Monument, Gates of it’s not all about food. Time on the land is time National Preserve, Alaska; temperature: the Arctic National Park and Preserve, Kobuk spent connecting and reconnecting with friends -42 °F; average wind speed: 71 mph; wind Valley National Park, and Noatak National and relatives, places, stories, and other values. chill: -97 °F (Sousanes and HiIl 2014). Preserve—encompass 19.3 million acres of Protecting the ecology, history, archaeology land and constitute approximately 25% of the and subsistence lifestyle of the U.S. Arctic is the This weather event exemplifies one of the land area managed by the National Park Service reason parks were established in northern Alaska. challenges of living in the Arctic: It can be cold. nationwide. These are undeveloped places with Then, of course, there is the light, or lack of free flowing rivers and extremely few facilities. As exemplified above, one of the defining it. Here at Howard Pass, the sun disappears Only a single road crosses these lands, a 23-mile characteristics of ecosystems is the climate. for close to a month in the dead of winter, but gravel industrial road through the northern Large bodies of open water tend to moderate in the midst of the summer, it stays above the end of Cape Krusenstern National Monument. climate. Temperatures tend to be more extreme horizon for a month. Another thing to consider The Interior parks in this cluster span the inland compared to the coast. The twist here regarding Howard Pass is the caribou (Rangifer rocky and barren mountains of the western is due to the annual formation of pack ice. tarandus). For thousands of years, caribou Brooks Range to the southern Chukchi Sea to This ice largely moderates the effect of the herds have migrated from the North Slope of the east. They include a variety of ecosystems: sea and for this reason, even coastal areas in Alaska to more southerly climates through this dry alpine tundra, lowland wet tundra, boreal Arctic parks can be intensely cold with little pass and back again. This can be a big event. In forest, coastal tundra, lagoons, and estuaries. precipitation during the winter months. To deal 2003, the Western Arctic Caribou Herd, whose This is wilderness at a massive scale with largely with these temperatures, winds, and the limited range encompasses Howard Pass, numbered intact ecosystems, but also a land that has been food and energy resources often associated approximately 490,000 animals (Dau 2015). inhabited by people for thousands of years. with the winter months, plants, animals, and Given the predictable migratory corridor, as people can adapt and survive in place, or they well as periods of great abundance of caribou, Fifteen thousand people live in northwestern can move to more favorable conditions. it’s not surprising that people are closely Alaska, and many of them access and transit attuned to this resource. For thousands of years, the parks to continue the long tradition of Movement is not an option for plants. What hunters have converged on Howard Pass and subsistence, including harvesting resources to do? One strategy is to get low. Plants here hug it contains one of the densest concentrations from this wild area. Inupiat people living in the ground. This not only allows them to take of archaeological sites in northern Alaska. Shishmaref, Wales, Deering, and Kotzebue advantage of any heat the earth has absorbed Devil Mountain, Bering Land Bridge National Preserve. NPS photo courtesy of Ken Hill 1 Alaska’s Northern Parks: The Wonder of the Arctic by land, sea, and air. On land, caribou are the champions. Some individuals have been known to cover more than 3,000 miles in a year (Fancy et al. 1989). In northwestern Alaska, caribou cycle between their calving areas on the North Slope of Alaska, to mid-summer insect-relief in coastal and mountainous areas before turning south to spend their winter on the Seward Peninsula; an annual migration of approximately 1,900 miles (Joly 2012). By sea, gray whales (Eschrichtius robustus) are acknowledged migration champions. The eastern stock of gray whales spend their summers feeding in the Chukchi, Beaufort, and northwestern Bering Seas. In the fall, the whales start their migration south swimming past Cape Krusenstern National Monument and Bering Land Bridge National Preserve. A few months later, they arrive at their winter destination off the coast of Mexico’s Baja Peninsula to breed and calve. By mid-February, Arctic alpine forget-me-not, Bering Land Bridge National Preserve. some whales are already heading north for NPS photo manuals describing leaves of Arctic plants include the summer season. This equates to a travel terms like “hirsute,” “pilose,” “pubescent.” All distance of approximately 10,000 miles (NOAA descriptions of a vegetative version of fleece. from the sun, it also removes them from the 2016a). Others like the bearded seal (Erignathus Not all arctic plants are hairy however. Wax barbatus) migrate with the annual formation desiccating effects of the wind. Another strategy isn’t a bad option either. Wax can help with the is to insulate. Insulation for a plant can take a and disappearance of pack ice. Bearded seals abrasion caused by being pelted by snow crystals are an “ice seal.” They use pack ice as a platform couple of forms. The tussock-forming sedge in the winter, and dust
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